Roden Aircraft 1/72 AN12BK Cub Transport Aircraft Kit
Model Airplane Depot
From the late 1950s the An-12 entered service in the Soviet national economy as well as with the arms of the military. The An-12 was the first Soviet military aircraft adopted by the Soviet Airmobile Paratroop forces; it was only plane which could carry AFV vehicles.
The An-12 had a long military service life: during the India-Chinese conflict in 1962, and in the 1965 India-Pakistan border conflicts, it was extensively used by the Indian Air Forces for transport and bombing. Egyptian An-12s delivered troops and UN peacemakers to the conflict zone during the Six Day War in 1967 and the Yom Kippur War in 1973. At the time of the Prague Spring in 1968 the An-12 very quickly delivered Soviet troops to the Czech capital. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979, many An-12s together with more modern IL-76s transported a huge quantity of Soviet troops and military freight to the country.
Even in the1990s "obsolete" An-12s still served in many countries. It took part in civil war in the former Yugoslavia and Angola; and Russia has used An-12s in anti-terror operations in Chechnya since this conflict began in 1994. In Afghanistan, An-12s belonging to the Taliban terrorist movement had been re-equipped for the bomber role, but were very quickly destroyed in late 2001, when operation Enduring Freedom began. At the end of 2000, about 167 of this type were still in service. Many An-12s are being used by air cargo companies, and Russia and Ukraine retain the type in their Air Forces at the present time.
